When we see records being broken and unprecedented events such as this, the onus is on those who deny any connection to climate change to prove their case. Global warming has fundamentally altered the background conditions that give rise to all weather. In the strictest sense, all weather is now connected to climate change. Kevin Trenberth

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Thursday, October 3, 2013

Enviros target Keystone in spill video

An environmental group is rolling out a new tactic today to fight the Keystone XL pipeline: an animated
video showing every significant oil, gas and chemical pipeline spill in the U.S. since 1986.

The group, the Center
for Biological Diversity, hopes the video will go viral and says it’s
aimed at stirring up enough public awareness of the pipeline industry’s
troubles to put pressure on three key Democratic
senators — Bill Nelson of Florida, Michael Bennet of Colorado and Amy
Klobuchar of Minnesota — to oppose any pro-Keystone legislation. It’s
also hoping to influence President Barack Obama’s final call on the
pipeline’s future.The video is part of a campaign aimed at spreading a simple message: Don’t trust the pipeline
industry.Contrary to claims by
the oil and gas industry, pipelines are not a safe way to ship energy,
said Noah Greenwald, director of the Arizona-based group’s endangered
species program. “For so many different reasons,
we need to be moving away from fossil fuels,” Greenwald said. “There’s
really no safe and clean way to deal with them.”But the oil industry has said pipelines are far safer than other transportation systems, such as rail cars or trucks.“Safety is the number
one priority for the oil and natural gas industry. Pipelines are one of
the safest ways to transport crude oil, gasoline, and other petroleum
products, and spills are extremely rare,”
said Carlton Carroll, a spokesman for the American Petroleum Institute.
“Even one spill is too many, and our industry, working with regulators,
continues to apply the highest standards and the latest technologies to
ensure the safe delivery of the energy needed
to fuel our economy.”The Center for
Biological Diversity is perhaps best known for its aggressive tactics to
enforce the Endangered Species Act, including the many lawsuits it has
filed accusing agencies like the Interior Department
and EPA of refusing to impose legally required protection for creatures
like the polar bear, California condor and Mexican gray wolf.Its animated spill map is based on data culled from nearly 8,000 incidents catalogued as
“significant” by the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety
Administration, including incidents that killed people, sent victims to
the hospital, caused more than $50,000 in damages, released more than
five barrels of volatile substances or triggered
an explosion or fire. The spills featured in the video involved natural
gas, oil and other hazardous liquids, such as diesel fuel, gasoline,
fuel oil and anhydrous ammonia.The group says the incidents have caused almost $7 billion in damage and killed more than 500 people since 1986.“The numbers add up to 76,000 barrels per year, nearly 300 incidents per year,” Greenwald said.The United States has
more than 180,000 miles of oil and liquids pipelines and more than
305,000 miles of natural gas pipelines, according to industry data.But the data also show
that, at least in terms of the volume of the spills, the three lowest
annual totals have occurred in the past five years, with the smallest
volume in 2012. Greenwald acknowledged the
downtrend in recent years, as well as the fact that a large percentage
of the spills are very minor.“A lot of the spills are small, but if it’s your land or the creek that you fish in … it’s very damaging,” he said.Environmentalists have
pointed to the oil-sands crude that Keystone would carry as a
particularly noxious type of oil that can be extremely difficult to
clean up after a spill, particularly in water. That
crude, which is mixed with light fluids to enable it to flow through
pipelines, appears to sink in water, making it far more difficult to
recover than crude oils that float on the surface.That’s what happened
when an Enbridge pipeline ruptured in July 2010, pouring more than
20,000 barrels of diluted oil-sands crude into the Kalamazoo River in
Michigan. The clean-up there is still ongoing,
with the costs to Enbridge likely to approach $1 billion.Another rupture on a
pipeline owned by ExxonMobil this March sent thousands of barrels of oil
streaming through a neighborhood in Mayflower, Ark.According to PHMSA data,
nearly 25% of the pipeline accidents were caused by excavation
damage, while more than 18% were from corrosion. Another 17% of the incidents happen because of
faulty materials or welding problems.

The Keystone fight has
been raging for five years, but with an Obama administration decision on
a needed permit expected before the end of the year, supporters and
opponents are ramping up their rhetoric.The Senate may also be
nearing a crucial vote in September on a pro-Keystone amendment that
Republicans would try to attach to widely popular energy efficiency
legislation. That outcome may depend on the
votes of a handful of Democrats, including Nelson, Klobuchar and
Bennet.Obama hasn’t yet tipped
his hand on whether the Keystone pipeline, which would connect the oil
sands fields in Alberta, Canada, to refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast,
will win the permit. But his comments
this week downplaying the number of jobs that the project will create
gave opponents hope that he may turn it down.In June, he warned that
the pipeline shouldn’t be built if it would increase greenhouse gases, a
statement that indicated the administration could be leaning on a State
Department draft report that said the
pipeline was a cleaner option than railroad cars or trucks to transport
the oil.Note: This story has
been updated to include a link to the animated video showing every
significant oil, gas and chemical pipeline spill in the U.S. since 1986.